LEADER IN EDUCATION
Lyons named director
After advertising nationally for a new director of education, it turns out the replacement for the retiring Paul Picard was just down the hall.
Current associate director Terry Lyons was announced Tuesday as the new head of the WindsorEssex Catholic District School Board following a special meeting of trustees.
Lyons will take over his new position Oct. 31.
“I’m excited and grateful trustees have placed their confidence in me,” said Lyons, who is also serving as executive superintendent of corporate services.
“I’m excited to embrace the new challenge.”
Lyons moved over to the Catholic board three years ago after working for 16 years in the Greater Essex County District School Board as a vice-principal, principal and superintendent.
He began his education career as a teacher in the York Catholic School Board before coming back to his native Windsor in 1999.
“Terry has demonstrated remarkable leadership qualities, a tremendous amount of experience and a firm commitment to Catholic education in Windsor-Essex,” board chair Barbara Holland said. “We’re extremely confident that he will create a faith-filled environment in our schools that will inspire scholastic greatness and exceed the expectations of our students, their families, our staff and all of our community stakeholders.”
Lyons said the reason he was interested in the board’s top job is the same as when he first began teaching.
“I’ve always wanted to make a difference for students, though I didn’t start out thinking about this job,” Lyons said.
“This job is one of the best ways I can make a difference and improve the lives of students.
“The most important aspect of the job is creating a system that is progressive and cultivates learning opportunities in faith-filled education,” he said.
Lyons admits he’s taking over a board that’s in a much better position than the one Picard took over seven years ago.
He’s inherited a board that has an accumulated surplus, reduced its excess student capacity to less than 1,000, enjoys stabilized student enrolment and has launched several new programming initiatives.
“Paul and his senior team have done the lion’s share of the work,” Lyons said.
“The board is in a very good position financially and we’ll have a number of creative program announcements to make shortly.”
Lyons feels being part of the rebirth of the board these past three years will help maintain the continuity through the leadership transition.
“I think it helped me with trustees that I was part of us building some momentum,” Lyons said.
“We have to continue that momentum.
“We have to build on the traditions we’ve established, but explore taking bold new steps.”
In addition to some new programming announcements, Lyons said his immediate priorities are to build relationships and analyze the structure of administration.
“We’re going to look at that to see what is the most efficient way to do things,” said Lyons of whether his current positions will be filled.
While the usual challenges of maintaining enrolment, the area’s aging demographics and funding issues are never far from the top of the list of concerns, Lyons said school boards are also being forced to respond more quickly to changes in the classroom.
“We used to talk about getting kids ready for school, but now it’s our job to get schools ready for kids,” Lyons said. “Their needs and what employers are requiring have changed dramatically.
“Students no longer sit in rows in the classroom. There’s more innovation, more collaborative learning, more partnerships with the community, the church and other educational institutions.
“The role of technology and global learning has transformed the classroom. There’s been a real paradigm shift,” he said.